Degree Year

2013

Document Type

Thesis - Open Access

Degree Name

Bachelor of Arts

Department

Psychology

Advisor(s)

Nancy Darling

Keywords

Memory consolidation, Psychology

Abstract

Memory consolidation is the process during which short-term memory is stabilized and long-term memory is formed. This study aims at investigating how physical and cognitive activities affect memory consolidation during wakefulness. There were four conditions: sit, sit-puzzle, walk and walk-puzzle and a repeated measure, within subject design was adopted. Participants engage in each condition for ten minutes immediately following a learning session, and this process was repeated for four times. Word recall was collected twice, both immediately after engaging in the task, and in the second day. Results revealed that engaging in physical activity alone (walk) led to the best recall performance. Recall score was diminished when physical activity was coupled with cognitive activity (walk-puzzle), and there was no difference between the two physically inactive conditions (sit and sit-puzzle). In addition, it was shown that physical activity provided favorable condition for memory consolidation especially when participants' were fatigue. Based on the results of this study, suggestions can be made to students that engagement in moderate exercise such as walking immediately following learning is beneficial to memorization.

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